This is an introduction to metacommunication.
Metacommunication is a term that you may not be familiar with.
We didn't really know what it was when we started.
Think of metacommunication as the message inside the message.
The first rule of effective intervention is being able to separate what is said and what is meant.
Metacommunication is what is communicated but unsaid.
It's reading between the lines.
Focusing on metacommunication is a way of hearing the unsaid,
Addressing it,
And finding an appropriate response to what wasn't said out loud but what was meant.
Metacommunication in the context of microaggressions has a lot to do with the relationship between the communicators.
It can be a comment about your hair,
Your skin,
Your facial features.
It may sound like a compliment,
But it may actually be communicating underlying assumptions about your race,
Your ethnicity,
Your gender,
Anything.
An example might be a man saying,
You're so pretty,
Your features don't really look Asian,
Implying that Asian women are not usually attractive and therefore may be of less societal value.
Or,
You're so articulate,
Implying that women of color are not usually well-spoken and are therefore less intelligent.
